


I am strong enough to let you in

by Chancy_Lurking



Category: The Witcher (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Jaskier | Dandelion, Emotionally Constipated Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia, Feelings Realization, Forgiveness, Friendship/Love, Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia Apologizes, Getting Together, Introspection, Love Confessions, M/M, Music, POV Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia, Post-Episode: S01E06 Rare Species, Reconciliation, Singing, i wish i could make that MUSIC tag bigger
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-28
Updated: 2020-12-28
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:09:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,968
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28386036
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chancy_Lurking/pseuds/Chancy_Lurking
Summary: Crushing the songs behind his teeth doesn’t really burn them out of him, not like he’d like. There’s still a part of him that thinks in poetry and melody, little tunes sparking off in his head from a specific clop of horses’ hooves or a particularly musical peal of laughter, but he never once lets them cross his lips. They’re all inane little tunes, anyway, nothing that’d be worth vocalizing even if he could.That may be why he hates Jaskier at first brush.(In which Geralt actually loved music as a child, but love and music are not for witchers.)
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Comments: 25
Kudos: 164





	I am strong enough to let you in

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Fangirlshrewt97](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fangirlshrewt97/gifts).



> This is for my dear friend who said it was beautiful when it was just a half-coherent comment in a chat thread. Now, did it need to be 7k words? Nope, but I save my self-control for special occasions. I hope you enjoy it, lovely.
> 
> Aside: I watched Netflix!Witcher and read fanfic. That’s all I know about canon.
> 
> Title from “Eight” by Sleeping at Last (If you want to get all in your feelings about Geralt, give it a listen.)

Most people upon meeting him would never even assume there was a place for music in the story of Geralt’s life, why would they?

Witchers are orphans and child surprises, unloved and unwanted, with nobody to care what happens to them. They’re mutants hardly better than the monsters they kill—just as unwanted and unloved, if needed a little more than another mouth to feed. That’s not the kind of story anyone wants to commemorate, not if the purges are any indication. If witchers are soulless monsters who don’t even _feel_ , what could they possibly know of or care for the arts?

They’d say they didn’t, never had. Even Geralt.

That’d make Geralt the biggest liar out of all of them, though. His memory was shredded in the Trials and all the trauma after it, but he remembers his beginning in fits and snatches, rabbits on the edge of his mind that he never chases into the dark. He remembers that when he had tiny hands, brown eyes, and a stuffed horse, that he also had a mouth full of noise that could some days be called music. Marching around the kitchen and his mother’s legs, he proclaimed his heroism as a knight and sang his own marching songs. Ones he’d heard somewhere else, ones he made up as he went. He sang lullabies with his mother and she told him he had a lovely voice; his singing, at least, she rarely told him to stop.

Then she left him on a roadside for the wolves to get and the songs started to shrivel up.

If pressed to think about it, and Geralt is very rarely _pressed_ to do anything, he’d admit it’s the Trial of Grasses that really did it, though.

At first, he’d cried himself to sleep like all the boys his age, but his sobbing was interspersed with singing, self-soothing little tunes mumbled around his fingers about brave men and going home and mothers, because he doubted his abandonment. For weeks, he believed she would come back and get him with the sort of faith only little children and fools display. When he was old enough to start training with live steal, he knew enough to keep his mouth shut.

Being pumped full of mutagens has a way of prying open the lips, though.

Geralt doesn’t have many distinct memories from those days, being chained to a table, feeling like he was being torn apart from his cells on out; the pain eats up too much of his mind to form a clear picture. He remembers screaming, though, _fuck_ does he. He’s sure he cursed every person he ever knew. He’s sure at the worst of it, the parts his brain has helpfully blacked out, he begged for it to stop.

More relevant to this tale, he remembers what must have been several days in, shivering so hard his skull was rattling against the table, a mouth full of blood and bile. Scared out of his fucking mind and in more pain than he’d ever been, only to hear one of the mages say, curious and amused, “ _Oh, it’s this one… I think it’s singing._ ”

Geralt had been too disoriented to realize they meant him for a second, until he realized he _was_ slurring a lullaby, had been wanting to shove his fingers in his mouth, too, _self-soothing_ like a fucking baby.

It shouldn’t have been possible for humiliation to cut through all the other shit wracking his body, but it did. It shoved a needle right through Geralt’s desire to ever sing aloud again. Singing out loud would be inviting that same mockery and humiliation from a world that already didn’t respect him. Singing is just a memory of all the pain he went through as a _child, they were all fucking children_ , and the fact that the people who did it didn’t even have any empathy towards him. Like they didn’t care that the last thing he heard could’ve been scorn, _Oh quaint, a singing witcher, maybe it dances, too!_

Crushing the songs behind his teeth doesn’t really burn them out of him, not like he’d like. There’s still a part of him that thinks in poetry and melody, little tunes sparking off in his head from a specific clop of horses’ hooves or a particularly musical peal of laughter, but he never once lets them cross his lips. They’re all inane little tunes, anyway, nothing that’d be worth vocalizing even if he could.

That may be why he _hates_ Jaskier at first brush.

It’s equal parts baffling and annoying at this kid could stand at the front of a room and declare himself a bard. Singing at the top of his voice, like people don’t throw shit at him and scream for him to shut up. Like it doesn’t _kill him_ that they do, because he truly believes his songs matter and he’s actually going to go down in history as the greatest songster who ever lived. It’s _ridiculous_.

The thing is, Geralt…is listening to him, though.

Generally, music grates on his nerves and he does his best to tune it out. Sometimes he’ll listen through the walls of the inn for no more reason than to keep up with politics he may need to dodge, he tells himself. But generally, he doesn’t let himself care.

Jaskier, though, he listens to enough to know the lyrics are all bullshit. It’s the kind of drivel that royals and courts full of people who’ve never seen a real monster suck down like wine, wide eyed and adventure-seeking from safe inside their castle walls. The incorrectly described and wildly made-up creatures, the wrong locations and times of year, the wrong way to kill them—it’s all fanciful bullshit and it’s _annoying._

That doesn’t stop Geralt from being enthralled. He _likes_ Jaskier’s voice, finds his playing, pleasant and that… makes him angry.

Music is not for witchers.

Then Jaskier catches sight of him, coming right over without trepidation— _dread has never been this light of a feeling, but Geralt doesn’t have a better name for what else this could be_ —and, well, it all goes downhill from there.

A decade long landslide, filled with so many horrors, but through them all Jaskier, and his laughter, and his constant companionship, and his _music_ , his songs for _Geralt_. Geralt never sings, the thought makes his stomach rise up the back of his throat, but like this it feels like he can have music. Jaskier is a living song, constantly dancing through Geralt’s mind without tripping the snares and traps of other music in his memories.

Jaskier playing tunes to the beat of Roach’s hooves, humming to himself when he’s trying to sleep, casually asking Geralt about fucking _chord progressions_ and somehow discerning sense from his silence or flat hums— _never melodic hums, witchers are not made for music_. Jaskier is, though, and he gives it freely to all, but always, always to Geralt.

“I’m the Bard of the White Wolf,” Jaskier had said, walking backwards and still strumming _Toss a Coin_ on his lute, not missing a step of either. He smiled wide and proud, and that dread-not-dread feeling expanded in Geralt’s chest, made him think in _poetry_. “It’s a little lengthier than _Jaskier_ , but I have to say, I like at least as much.”

A decade long landslide that seems like it has finally crashed to an end at the top of a mountain when Geralt, once again, couldn’t keep his fucking mouth shut when it counted.

It feels like the silence left in Jaskier’s wake carves its way through Geralt’s chest and settles in, cold and hard, where music used to live. The dread-not-dread feeling he had around Jaskier leaves nothing but sinking _dread-dread_ in its wake and Geralt keeps thinking about being delirious with pain in the basements of Kaer Morhen, subconsciously seeking comfort in song. All the songs he finds cycling his mind now come to him in Jaskier’s voice before he viciously shoves the thoughts away, fists trying to ward off a thunderstorm.

Meditating doesn’t bring him peace, just closes him in with his thoughts, but…he has to look at them, has to know what he’s fighting, because he’s losing. Because maybe that dread-not-dread feeling was about recognizing his fate when it isn’t forced, when it’s just a slow weaving of choices. And maybe Geralt had never recognized it because he had never known _anticipation_ as a good thing, was only ever waiting for the next tragedy, the next attack, never something good. Maybe he was always holding his breath when Jaskier offered him good after good, because maybe… maybe it wasn’t something witchers were meant to recognize.

Maybe the word for all of this is love.

Maybe Geralt just broke everyone’s heart in one fell swoop, including his own.

“Fuck,” Geralt says, when he’s alone, and he is _alone_. For quite some time. “ _Fuck,_ ” he says, a lot.

There’s a war and a finally-found child surprise between Geralt and the next time he sees Jaskier.

It’s been a long time since he’s heard music that didn’t make him sick with grief. Geralt is all set to forcibly tune out the lute playing when they open the door to the inn, until he recognizes the man holding it. Watching Jaskier’s fingers freeze on the strings the second he sees Geralt, his tune left ringing sour in the silence, hurts in a way he’s not expecting.

Ciri, who is actually some kind of little goblin, sees him, too, and immediately punches Geralt directly in his ribs. It winds him, not because she’s all that strong—she’s all of thirteen and he’s a _witcher_ wearing armor—but because she, without hesitation, always treats him like he wouldn’t even dream of hurting her. The rest of the room startles like they’re about to witness a massacre, even with the glamor masking her identity, but Geralt is more focused on the way Jaskier’s eyebrows raise, mouth falling open.

Yennifer’s magic is not easily seen through, but Jaskier knows Geralt like he knows music and his eyes dart to Ciri immediately. “ _Oh_.”

“ _Apologize,_ ” Ciri hisses under her breath and Geralt almost wishes he hadn’t told her why Jaskier wasn’t with him, almost wishes he’d been _more_ honest so she’d know that an apology might not be enough. Still, he lets her take the coins from his hand and go sort out a room on her own. He never loses track of her, can hear her conversation as she charms the inn keeper word for word, but approaches Jaskier unerringly.

The shock has worn off Jaskier’s face, replaced by something preternaturally still that doesn’t in anyway hide the anxiety and pain in his scent. “Geralt…” he says and his voice is as welcome as it always is even if his anxiety is contagious, creeps down Geralt’s spine.

“Jaskier,” Geralt greets, keeping his voice low. “I’m—” he starts, but doesn’t know where to go with it. He would very much like to avoid airing their dirty laundry in a crowded tavern with a blurted apology. “I know I have no right to ask, but I’d like to speak with you. If I could interrupt,” he adds quickly, motioning at the lute in Jaskier’s hands.

Jaskier’s eyebrows raise delicately. “The manners are new,” he says loftily, but his eyes track Ciri up the stairs with something like relief. “Sure, interrupt away. I don’t think I feel like playing right now, anyway.”

The words ring a bit like an accusation, but Jaskier probably has no clue how painful the jab lands. Jaskier is meant to be noise and motion and Geralt hates to have taken that from him for even a moment.

“Thank you,” Geralt remembers to say, turning and following after Ciri. He comes to a halt when he finds her standing in the stairwell with her fists on her hips. “ _Fiona…_ ” he warns.

Ciri doesn’t move. “I’m locking myself in the room and you’re not coming in until Jaskier says you can!” she declares, sprinting up the stairs before he can even reply. He could catch her, but the bark of laughter from behind him stills him before he even braces to start.

“As feisty as ever, I see! Glad she hasn’t lost that,” Jaskier says and it sounds like a question.

Geralt listens to the door at the end of the hall slam and lock before he grunts, heading out the front door instead. “Not in the slightest.”

Not really sure where his feet are taking him, Geralt wanders around to the side of the building mostly to put himself under the window of Ciri’s room. He glances up to confirm he could scale it if need be, but turns when Jaskier makes a delighted little sound.

“Oh, Roach, lovely girl, still toting this fellow around, are you!” Jaskier says, wandering over to the stables where Roach’s ears have flicked forward, perked up at the sight of him. She is remarkably patient with him rubbing her nose. “Oh, I wish I had an apple for you, I promise I’ll have a worthy treat next time.”

Geralt clings to the words ‘ _next time_ ’ and tries to use them to steady his nerves. He walks up to Jaskier and waits for him to turn around, face a touch less warm than it had been for Roach.

“Well,” Jaskier starts, folding his arms. “You got your interruption. What do you want with it?”

“I’m sorry,” Geralt says immediately.

Jaskier takes this with guarded eyes, but nods. “Okay.”

 _Okay._ Not good enough, then.

“I’m… I’m sorry for the way I acted after— _hm_ ,” Geralt shakes his head, wincing at his own memories. They both know what he’s talking about. “I’m sorry for shouting at you and I’ve regretted every word ever since. That was—You don’t—I…” He presses his lips together, unused to letting so many of the words in his head escape past the filter of his teeth. It feels like vomiting, he doesn’t understand how Jaskier is this open without being left revolted and exhausted from the experience. “You didn’t deserve any of it, certainly not after all these years of being…true.” He wilts a little under the inadequacy of the words, under Jaskier’s gaze. “It was cruel of me. I will never forget that and I will never do it again.”

For an unusual and uncomfortably long span of time, Jaskier doesn’t respond, just stares at him. Geralt can hear his heart pounding, an uptick from before, and he smells…still sad, _fuck_ , but duller in a way that makes Geralt realize it must’ve been lingering on him this whole time. Like the words on the mountain have been weighing on Jaskier, made heavier by distance and silence instead of healing. Geralt is starting to think he should’ve said his piece and left, should’ve promised to never seek Jaskier out again, even if trying to organize those words make him feel precariously close to actually being sick.

Geralt hasn’t fought a single monster harder than he fights to make himself walk away, but this is the one that feels like a fight he can’t win. If ever there was a song meant to be in his heart, it is meant to be sung in Jaskier’s voice. He already hates himself for letting him go the first time, he won’t be the one to turn and walk away this time and condemn himself to silence. “Jask,” he says gently and watches Jaskier’s expression crumble some, eyes darting away. “Jaskier, I don’t know where to start asking for forgiveness, but whatever price you ask of me, it’s yours.”

Jaskier spasms back into sound and motion at that, a quick, jittery laugh breaking free as he wipes a hand down his face. He blurts a watery reply, “I want a truth from you.”

“You— _What_?” Geralt sputters.

“I’ll forgive you, you have to know I will, Geralt,” Jaskier sighs, running a hand through his hair, before finally facing Geralt again. “I won’t even know if you con me out of my condition, but I have to ask it and I want it, honestly. Tell me the truth, in _words_ ,” he adds with a pointed jab at Geralt’s chest before motioning around. “About you, about _us_ , Geralt, _anything_ because I’ve been feeding the space between us with everything I have ‘til now and I don’t want to prop us up alone anymore.”

Geralt first thinks of the dreadful silence he’s been carrying since they parted ways and how Jaskier probably heard it when they were together, tried eagerly to fill it, pick up the slack Geralt was leaving him. If it hurt even half as much, Geralt doesn’t at all understand Jaskier’s readiness to give him a path to forgiveness. Then, he thinks of the saccharine love songs Jaskier sometimes sings and wonders if he wants him on his knees, declaring his love and devotion for all time. He wonders if he could make himself do that.

What comes out is even more vulnerable, though.

“You make me want to sing,” Geralt admits stiltedly.

Jaskier looks poleaxed by that, stunned back into stillness. “I _what_?”

“I… I used to…” Geralt stumbles over the truth of a story he’s never told out loud, but he promised Jaskier whatever he wanted and this is the biggest truth he has. He’ll lay it up as sacrifice if that’s what it takes. “I sang when I was a child,” he confesses quietly, feeling overexposed even though he knows there isn’t a single other person in earshot. “I sang constantly, I _loved_ music, but…” he has to steel himself to say, “the Trials took a lot of things from me.”

Geralt gets taken back there for a moment— _I think it’s singing_ —and focusing on Jaskier’s heartbeat, his face and scent, even with the horror in both, is the only thing keeping him grounded in the present.

“Just the thought of singing made me _sick_ , until…you,” Geralt continues, the words weighted with the awe he’s never let himself acknowledge, let alone admit to anyone. “Until your songs and your fearlessness and growth, and I just…” He takes a deep breath and takes a leap of faith, “You… You sing your _love_ for anyone to hear like it doesn’t _hurt_. I want to sing like that. I want to make _you_ feel like that.”

Jaskier’s eyes well instantly, but his scent fills with a rush of honest joy. “To be clear, is that what this is for us?” he asks, stepping well into Geralt’s space when he prompts, “Love?”

The urge to fall on old habits like a sword is there, defensively. To drag out the old rumor that witchers could never feel anything like that, to make Jaskier move away from him, to never give anyone the power to hurt him the way loving someone would. Geralt doesn’t think it for more than a moment though, would never throw it in the face of everything— _anything_ Jaskier is offering him.

Geralt nods. “I’m truly sorry I ever tried to make it seem like anything else,” he says, for once in his life aching to touch someone more than his good sense can stop. His hand comes up to Jaskier’s cheek and he doesn’t so much as blink at the touch. “None of what I said on the mountain was true, you’ve…been the best part of my life so far.”

“ _Gods,_ Geralt,” Jaskier gasps and then he’s falling into him.

In their time apart, specifically his time with Ciri, Geralt has gotten much more accustomed to hugs, can return them without feeling like a stiff. It has never, since the day he found Ciri alone in the woods, left him feeling so nearly weak with relief. He’s never gotten to have Jaskier this close and really appreciate it. Today, he doesn’t waste any time squeezing him tight and tucking his nose into Jaskier’s hair, breathing deep. He can feel Jaskier’s breath against his neck, hear Jaskier’s heart pounding away, but his pulse only pushes out swells of relief and happiness; the sadness still there, but fading under everything else.

“Thank you,” Geralt whispers, because even if it’s only this moment, only today it’s more than he’s ever had. He startles when Jaskier turns to kiss his cheek like that’s something he’s _ever_ done before.

“Thank _you_ , Geralt, this means a lot, truly,” Jaskier says. “I can finally stop wasting away like a widow.” He pulls back to look Geralt in the face, tutting at the flicker of guilt on his face. “None of that, now, we’re moving past it. My dear, if you ever think to sing for me, I’d be delighted to hear you.”

Geralt’s insides swim at the thought, but he doesn’t let the harsh shutdown his instincts fling at him come out of his throat. “I don’t think I can.”

Jaskier hums, nodding. “Then I’ll sing for you. Any day you’d like me to.”

“I’d wear out your voice,” Geralt warns him, a flash of amusement in his chest when Jaskier smacks him on the shoulder.

“Don’t challenge me!” Jaskier says, sniffing. “Now,” he sniffs again, turning into Geralt’s palm when he wipes his cheek. “Now, take me to this, ah, _Fiona_. I’ll restore your good name with her.”

Geralt rolls his eyes, but Jaskier is already walking away, his hand caught in Geralt’s armor tugging him into motion.

The warmth of that allowance is not lost on either of them.

There’s still something tentative to their interactions for quite a while—even after Jaskier cajoles Ciri into letting Geralt into the room and she happily latches onto their new companion. Sometimes Geralt catches Jaskier looking at him like he isn’t quite sure he’s real, like he’s waiting for the other shoe to drop and Geralt to change his mind. Distrust may be a bit strong of a word, but it still hurts. Geralt doesn’t blame him for it, though. They’re both trying.

Ciri takes up a lot of space when she’s able, when they’re away from other people, but Geralt still tries to contribute more verbally. Geralt requests a song, in _words_ , and Jaskier nearly levitates off the ground. He answers Jaskier’s questions for the most part, unless he’s being a tease for sport, and watches it boggle and amuse Jaskier every time. It’s not quite to the territory of being _nice_ , but Jaskier had loved him for years when he was cantankerous at best. His affections are, at least, no longer begrudging. He replies, even if just in hums, to let Jaskier know he’s not being ignored; he reaches out to let him know he’s wanted. Every time his hands land on Jaskier’s skin, he’s met with a wave of happiness and no fear, Geralt feels music in his heart. Ciri is _insufferably_ smug about this, asks constantly for love songs that Geralt puts in a lot of effort to be annoyed about with a remarkable lack of success.

Jaskier looks flushed at first, but it’s never with embarrassment and he always indulges her. Especially when he realizes Geralt is not going to tell him to shut up outside of active danger, terms he has graciously accepted. He may have risked himself as a young man, but he will not risk Ciri. Geralt rests easy with this knowledge.

By the time they reach Kaer Morhen, Geralt has grown alarmingly used to falling asleep with Ciri safe between them and, on some very gentle, lucky nights getting to hear Jaskier mumbling lullabies over the top of her head. They’re both exhausted and anxious upon reaching the gates—it’s not a trail for humans, even with the help of a witcher—but they stand tall long enough to let Vesemir appraise them.

When he doesn’t find them lacking, because of course he doesn’t, they’re showed to their rooms.

They don’t even insinuate using them that night, piling into Geralt’s the moment they’re left alone.

For all the tragedy that led them here, it’s maybe the best winter Geralt has ever had.

Ciri and Jaskier are light and motion, more than has ever graced the halls of his home, probably even during its zenith. It takes getting used to, for all of them, but Ciri takes to training like a fish to water, from anyone who will take the time to show her something new. Jaskier works wherever Vesemir will set him to earn his stay, but caries a tune with him everywhere he goes. Whatever song anyone cares to ask for, a half-written ballad he’s working on, a few memorization songs to keep track of the ingredients of the potions he’s learned to make. They all learn a number of new work songs that winter, echoing down the halls—joyously because Ciri is trying to strum along on his lute, or distractedly because he’s focused on not losing his place in a recipe, or in irritation because he managed to nick his finger, or breathlessly while he’s mucking stalls or sweeping halls or chopping wood. Geralt can follow the sound of his voice right to him just about any time he wants.

“Songbird’s got a set of lungs on him,” Lambert observes when they’re training one day. He spits out some blood, recentering with a smirk. “Surprised we haven’t heard you make him _scream_ yet.”

Geralt doesn’t rise to the bait of dignifying that with a response, launching into his next attack while steadfastly ignoring the heat in his face.

There are a number of new love songs Jaskier has written, will sing quietly, a smile pressed against Geralt’s ear at night. It makes Geralt _squirm_ , flushed and embarrassed and _happy_ in a way he’s never been and therefore never learned to hide sufficiently. Every single song, even the ones made up on the spot, slurred between kisses as they fall asleep, mean more to Geralt than he will ever be able to properly articulate. He’s been called a lot of things, but never _beautiful_ , never _beloved_ , never _my dear wolf_ , never _my moon and my stars_.

Bringing someone joy is nothing Geralt usually aspires towards, but for Jaskier he does. Jaskier makes it so wonderfully easy for him, too. Returning a smile, tapping his toe during a performance, pulling him to sit close against his side when they’ve gathered around for the evening, a nose pressed into his neck to breathe in the scent of his laughing happiness every time he can. Every _Jask,_ or _Dandelion_ , or _My Songbird_ , or _Dear Heart_ is met with a spark of happiness, so Geralt gives them whenever he can.

But there is another little… There’s a thought Geralt keeps having.

In an unusual show of restraint, Jaskier hasn’t asked Geralt about singing again. True to his word, he sings whenever the fancy strikes him, no longer holds back unless someone is deeply concentrating or he’s truly bone tired. Geralt constantly has Jaskier’s songs running through his head, dangerously close to coming out of his mouth.

Once, _once_ he catches himself humming along to where he can hear Ciri singing a rhythmic song Jaskier wrote for her as she works her footwork drills, but Vesemir steps out into the courtyard and Geralt very nearly wants to throw himself off a cliff. The thoughtless pleasure flees immediately and he feels cornered and ill. The way his scent sours with _fear_ takes Vesemir’s face from mildly shocked to grim.

“Don’t stop on my account,” he says gruffly, but it’s not a taunt or a challenge. “I knew the lark was contagious the moment you started talking about him.” He eyes Geralt carefully before he continues on his way to meet Ciri for training. “I’d forgotten what happiness smells like on you. Give him our gratitude how you can, boy.”

The surprise Geralt is feeling at all of that, _every single word of it_ , holds him frozen where he’d been working. His dread recedes with every step Vesemir takes from him until he feels stupid for such a strong reaction. _Music isn’t for witchers_ , isn’t something Vesemir had ever told him, just one of those implied truths he’d accepted with all of the other shit thrown at him. They were also told love isn’t for witchers, but Geralt has never been so loved as he is right now, has never _been_ so in love.

Jaskier doesn’t love him because he wants something out of it, but still Geralt wants to give. He’s given him decades of barely-there affection and nearly ruined it all with misplaced anger. Even having been forgiven, even though he’s letting himself be the man Jaskier saw in him and loved, he still has more to give.

It takes a few days to settle himself, but he always feels the most peace in Jaskier’s presence or in Kaer Morhen, so this winter he has both in spades. It doesn’t keep his heart from picking up the pace slightly, enough that he wonders if Jaskier notices where he’s sprawled across him. He’s quiet tonight, dozing, but he wakes up some when Geralt starts drumming a gentle beat with his fingers against his shoulder. The shock that takes over his scent when he starts humming Jaskier’s favorite lullaby almost makes Geralt lose his nerve. Jaskier has frozen like if he even breathes too suddenly, he’ll startle Geralt silent and, to be fair, it’s not an unfair assumption. Still, Geralt draws in a long breath of Jaskier’s delight and contentedness and continues humming, even when he feels Jaskier’s tears pooling on his chest.

“Rusty,” he offers as an apology, stroking Jaskier’s spine.

“No,” Jaskier shakes his head, though, sits up and wipes his face and Geralt’s chest, kissing the latter before pressing a kiss to Geralt’s jaw as well. “That was lovely, Geralt, thank you.”

“You’re just easy,” Geralt deflects, smiling when Jaskier bites him in retaliation.

It’s a little like undamming a river. Geralt isn’t so confident as to sing, but sometimes, when he’s feeling particularly bold and happy, he’ll hum to himself. Jaskier is through the roof every time he hears it, Ciri seeming even more enthused about her casual lute lessons if Geralt will hum scales with her.

“If I’d known that was all it took, I would’ve found you a bard sooner,” Eskel says when they’re in the lab together, but not unkindly. He laughs good naturedly when Geralt stops his absent humming to shoot him a sour look. “No, seriously. I’d missed your songs.”

Geralt freezes, because he’d—they’d been so _young_ , almost a century ago, they hadn’t even had enhanced senses yet. He turns to find Eskel pointedly not looking at him, focused on the potion he’s mixing with an intensity he doesn’t really need. In Geralt mind, nobody had ever heard him. He isn’t sure how he feels about someone else knowing. If he had to pick one of his brothers, though, he’s glad it’s Eskel.

“It’s not just bards in general,” he says, just to be clear.

Eskel snorts. “Yeah, Geralt, my nose and eyes still work.”

If they weren’t mixing noxious herbs Geralt would shove him. As it stands, he just goes back to humming the tune Jaskier had made up to remember all the steps of making the potion. He doesn’t need it any more than Eskel does, but…if it makes them happy, there is no harm in it here. That is really freeing knowledge, actually, eases something in Geralt that he’d learned to live with having tense.

The outside world is going to have nothing but awful stored up for him, for a long time yet, until Ciri can protect herself fully probably, but he’s stolen this back from it. He has music again, dozens of songs from his beloved and even the hesitant tunes of his child surprise, his _daughter_ is learning. It’ll be a secret outside the safety of these walls, but that’s still more than he had to tide him over before. And anyway, it’s not like he’d ever sing where other humans could hear any more than he’d have serious conversations around them. Roach listens to him talk, she’d probably care just as much about his singing. Jaskier would care more, but in the good way. Admittedly, as much as Geralt would like to leave him safe in Kaer Morhen, he also has dreamily imagined them laying in a clearing on the Path, Geralt singing softly for him over the quiet sounds of a forest at night.

The daydream fills him with equal parts anticipation and dread, because… Geralt’s got a song stuck in his heart. It makes him think he understands Jaskier just a little better, because if one song stewing in him makes him feel like _this_ , he doesn’t know how Jaskier, who carries dozens, ever stops composing. The words keep changing every time he thinks them and it’s driving him up the wall because they’re not _right_ , he can’t give Jaskier a half-thought-out song. He’s terrified of the premise of giving him a song at all, but it’s stuck in his heart, lodged half way out his mouth, and he wants to give it up.

“What’s gotten into you?” Jaskier asks, when he notices the smell of burning pages in his—their—bedroom and ink stains lingering on his fingers.

Geralt doesn’t want to lie, but the truth isn’t ready to be served up yet, not this hot. He offers a truth that isn’t quite the answer to the question he was asked. “I want your songs in the library,” he mumbles. “You’re part of the story of witchers now, but I…”

Jaskier rears back some, a hand coming up to his chest. He looks touched. “Oh, darling, have you been—? Of _course_ , I’ll transcribe them for you,” he kisses Geralt’s forehead. “I’ll even write out sheet music.”

“Hm. Thank you,” Geralt says, and kisses him properly.

By the time the ice starts to break into spring, Jaskier has written up _Toss A Coin_ as well as every other song he’s written about witchers, their potions, their hearts, and Kaer Morhen in a tome Vesemir full intends to make a proper binding for by the time they’re back for the next winter.

And Geralt has one crumpled piece of paper, the last version in a long line of a song he’s written to hell and back twenty times over. If he pokes at it anymore, he’s certain it’ll bend out of shape and he’ll never let it meet a living ear.

As it stands, he folds it into his pocket about a week before Yennifer is set to show up to take her season of training Ciri while the witchers, minus Vesemir, return to the Path.

Jaskier isn’t hard to convince away from the keep now that it’s not completely frigid outside. He’s been cooped up, so when Geralt asks him to come along, he doesn’t hesitate even as he pesters Geralt about where they’re going.

“On a walk,” Geralt answers, to be difficult. He smirks at Jaskier’s predictable pout.

“Oh, we’re doing _this_ , are we?” he says, turning to walk backwards in front of Geralt, trusting the witcher to watch his way for him. “Is this a test? You know I’d follow you anywhere already. I’m very persistent.”

“Not a test,” Geralt replies, tries not to get overwhelmed by Jaskier’s unending loyalty.

The clearing isn’t a far walk, but far enough that Geralt won’t have to worry about any of his nosier family members overhearing. He’d also hear if they walked up unless they were really trying to sneak perhaps, but given what they probably imagine Geralt is out here to do to Jaskier, they won’t.

That’s decidedly not why they’re out here, but he’ll accept the privacy granted by the assumption nevertheless.

“Oh, well this is pretty,” Jaskier says, looking up at the clouds passing over head through the treetops. “If this is a seduction attempt, it’s working so far.”

Geralt laughs slightly, the sound making Jaskier smirk like he’s won something. “I think I’ve already managed that.”

“You certainly have, but a man likes to feel special,” Jaskier says, coming back to his side to wrap his arms around him. “Well? Are you going to have your wicked way with me?”

This close, Geralt can’t help but kiss him, but he keeps it sweet, brief. “Not just now,” he says softly. “Sit down a moment, would you?”

Jaskier gives him a curious look, but agreeably steps out of his arms. “Okay?” He sits down in the new grass, but half twists when Geralt walks around behind him. “What are you—?”

“Don’t look,” Geralt tells him.

“Okay, okay, what game is this?” Jaskier says, closing his eyes. Geralt just looks at him for a moment, completely trusting and as beautiful as ever in the sunlight. “ _Ooh!_ Am I going to have to find you on hearing alone to get my prize?” He points confidently in his direction as Geralt unfolds the paper he’d tucked away, _he’s nearly sweated the damn ink off the page_. He has to turn his back to Jaskier, focus on the words he’s written. “Ciri and I have been practicing that, she’s _excellent_ at it, but I’m nothing to thumb your—”

Geralt clears his throat once, softly. “ _It’s—It’s a little bit funny,_ ” he interrupts choppily and, _fuck_ , maybe he should’ve practiced this out loud, but he hears Jaskier’s teeth click shut in shock and he can’t stop now. “ _This feeling inside…_ ”

It’s not an overly complex song. Compared to some of the ones Jaskier has written, some of the ditties he’s made up _on the fly_ , Geralt isn’t sure it’s even _good_. But it’s the honest truth Jaskier asked him for when they first reunited and Jaskier had said he’d want to hear Geralt sing.

Writing a song for him feels like the biggest expression of love Geralt could give.

So, he sings the song he wrote, even if it takes all of his focus to keep his hands from shaking as he finishes, “ _I hope you don’t mind that I put down in words, how wonderful life is while you’re in the world._ ”

When Geralt stops singing, he can hear Jaskier’s heart pounding, but can’t face him right off. Not until he hears a smothered little sound and his brain pings with alarm, starts screaming that it’s _laughter_. He whips around, heart dropping through the ground, to find Jaskier’s shoulders trembling and Geralt has never _felt hurt like this_ for all of the two seconds it takes his nose to catch up with him.

Jaskier smells like happiness even though Geralt can smell his tears.

“Jaskier?” he says, the whirlwind of emotions in his chest making him want to run deep into the woods until the world stops. He stands there, though, watching Jaskier shake his head.

“I’m sorry, oh,” he says— _sobs_ into his hand, “ _Fuck_ , Geralt, you _…_ ”

Quickly making his way across the space between them, Geralt tries to get a look at Jaskier’s face, can see that it’s flush and streaked with tears before he turns away. He kneels in front of him “Jas, no, please, come here. What—?”

Jaskier surges forward to wrap him in his arms, knocking him nearly flat on his ass as he cries, “ _I love it._ ”

Geralt loses the tension in his shoulders all at once. “Oh.”

“Oh, gods, did you think—?” Jaskier immediately sits back, eyes panicked and wide, streaming a steady flow of tears. He takes Geralt’s face in his hands. “No, no, I’m sorry, Geralt, my love. It was wonderful. That was absolutely beautiful. I adore it, more than any song I’ve ever heard, it’s just…” His mouth twists and he fights back a sob, shaking his head. “Nobody, not a single other person on this planet has ever written a song for me. Nobody has ever thought I was _worth_ writing a song about.” He loses his battle with his composure and Geralt’s heart _breaks_ for him. “And the first song you’ve sung in gods know how long, the first song you’ve ever _written_ is _beautiful_ , and it’s for _me_ , and I just— _Geralt!_ ” he sobs.

Geralt feels love bright and liquid in his chest, wipes at Jaskier’s face. “You’re all I ever want to sing about, dear heart,” he has to confess. It makes Jaskier cry a little harder, but Geralt thinks that may be okay, just pulls him back against his chest until he calms down.

“Geralt, from the bottom of my heart, thank you for this,” Jaskier says once he’s gathered himself some, adoration alight in his face. He kisses him like he’s precious and fragile and it so sweet it stings before he pulls back to breathe softly, “I love you more than I will _ever_ have enough words to sing.”

The words are given with no hesitation, not even a blip of doubt in his heartbeat. He smells like safety and truth and home and he has never given Geralt reason to mistrust his feelings.

Today, with Jaskier wrapped in his arms, both of them awash in the smell of their combined happiness, Geralt doesn’t feel like he ever really stood a chance against this. It just feels like relief, like finally being able to breathe when he replies, “I love you the same, Jaskier.”

There is no fear in his chest as he says the words, nothing that leaves him feeling exposed or appalled at himself. A bright swelling happiness makes a home in his ribs when Jaskier smiles at him like he hung the sun and kisses him again.

No, there’s no fear at all, just a heart full of song.

**Author's Note:**

> Geralt is singing “Your Song” by Elton John
> 
> May 2021 treat you decently if not well!


End file.
